press

Conservatoire of Music, Dance and Dramatic Arts in Belfort

The Concrete Centre is part of the Mineral Products Association,
the trade association for the aggregates, asphalt, cement, concrete,
dimension stone, lime, mortar and silica sand industries.

VEIN
GLORIOUS
Pamela Buxton finds out why a French
architect took a splatter gun to the
facade of his new music school

For two months, artists Max Coulon and Gabriel
Khokha threw paint at the pristine concrete
surfaces of the newly completed Henri Dutilleux
Conservatoire of Music, Dance and Dramatic Arts
in Belfort, north-east France.
This was no act of vandalism. Instead it is an
entirely deliberate marbled effect conceived to
enhance the monolithic form of the 3,895m2
building. The conservatoire contains 36 classrooms
as well as rehearsal rooms, drama studios, a library,
amphitheatre and auditorium.
Architect Dominique Coulon & Associés had the
idea for a surface embellishment to the concrete
structure quite late in the design process. “The
building backs onto woodland, and we felt it was
a good idea to offer a texture that reflected that.
The veins can be seen as tree branches or the
veins found in natural stone,” says Dominique
Coulon, adding that the design was inspired by
the paintings of Jackson Pollock. “We were looking
for a texture in keeping with the presence of the
concrete which would function as a filter.”
The architects wanted the building to appear
enigmatic. This explains its largely insular form –
only the cantilevered dance room offers extensive
views in and addresses the town’s monumental
Belfort Lion sculpture on the hillside opposite by
Statue of Liberty sculptor Frédéric Bartholdi.
The artwork accentuates this sense of otherness, covering all surfaces except those “hollowed
out” of the building mass. “We wanted to
emphasise the singularity of the building,” says
Coulon. “This strange texture raises questions.
The building takes on an atypical character in
relation to its environment.”
The artists worked directly onto the concrete
structural walls, which were cast in situ using
metal formwork panels with lengths of 240cm. It
was the first time that they had attempted such
a work on a building and, unlike Pollock, they had
the added difficulty of working on vertical surfaces
and even undersides. They practised the splattered
paint effects on derelict industrial buildings and
made their own tools in order to achieve the right
density of paint. The final work was carried out
from a mobile cradle using a light and dark shade of
blue, the two lines of paint splatters intertwining to
produce a circular movement.
In the courtyard at the heart of the building, the
walls were given a “negative drip” of white on a
black background. According to the architect, this
reversal of the treatment adds drama to the space
and is the ultimate expression of density.
Internally, the concrete walls, floor and staircase
of the entrance hall and circulation areas are
left unadorned due to their “excellent texture”,
says Coulon, with no treatment other than a dust
protection system.